Jim Pillsbury's Web Blog

Monday, March 16, 2009

Beacon Hill Roll Call.. Pam's Newsletter

Voters,

This weeks Beacon Hill Roll Call report:

H 3415, The House and Senate 145 - 0 and 37 -0 approved a supplemental budget and sent to Deval for his paw print to raid the Rainy Day Fund for this years 2009 budget. The amount of 237 million will pay for snow removal (105 Mil) , give the State 90 days to process your tax refund w/o paying interest and a reduction of 286,000 in the Governors office.

My spin... sure pay for snow removal in an emergency situation, but they could have cut 132 million from places like, the Legislators salary and perks, 40 Mil, Fraud, 10 million, wage freeze and pay raises 160 million, combining state agencies, 30 million.

More bad news for the taxpayer, but good news for all State mployees. While I'm well aware of many sectors of State Employment that are not being paid well at all, like health care workers, and social service workers, etc, many of the other functions of the State cost to much money and when toll workers make more than teachers, something has to change.

Pams New Letter: FYI.. You can't get this from her web site. www.pamrichardson.com

I've only copied and pasted the first section:

Our state and our community face unprecedented times. The staggering economy, plummeting tax revenues, job losses and fiscal crisis has created challenges not seen in decades. There is not a family, neighbor or friend not feeling the strain created by this economic crisis.

In order to meet these challenges government must reform and change. It must be more responsive, more efficient and more effective in delivering services. We must question past practices and identify innovations and 21st century solutions.

The House of Representatives is working aggressively to reform and retool state government. We have identified several priority areas:

Rules Reform It is clear we need to change the way state government does business and work harder to restore the public' trust and faith and transparency in all that we do.

We recently passed a set of reforms governing the operations of the House of Representatives:

These reforms complement a set of initiatives previously acted upon which curbed late-night sessions and prohibit all-night sessions, leading to a more transparent and open state government.

Now I know that some of you could care less about what she says and does, while some of you would like to know this information for various reasons. But I want you all to know that what she has published and laid claim to as nothing more than out right proganda and very misleading. One might interrupt her work as really beneficial to us and how we could feel better about her work in reforming the mass State House.

This is just not true. She and her one party loyalists have rejected the following in ethics reform:

Rules Reform: H 2009 House Rules Not even close to living up to a higher standard of openness, fairness and equality.

Equal Representation on Ethics Committee: defeated 22 - 133 just as it sounds, equal is the part the one party refused on this vote

Audit House Accounts: defeated 16 - 137 yup.. they want no part of auditing

Removal of Committee Chairs and Leadership: again defeated 17 - 137 so once again, if you are caught in unethical and illegal behavior, you get to keep your job.

Values Based Ethics Training: defeated 17 - 137, they say that the current training is adequate... we all can believe that eh?

Raiding Rainy Day Fund: defeated 20-133 they don't want a two thirds approval before raiding the fund.

So when you hear, our reps say, and most will say, they have done much in the way of ethics reform already this year, please keep the truth in mind for future reference. They clearly have their own agenda to protect and to serve and to a great extent it doesn't serve us at all. More lip service and no results.